Speaker 1 (00:00:00) - Welcome to I love it Here, a place where we discuss and share our thoughts on various topics, all focused on making life and work a better experience for everyone.

Speaker 2 (00:00:26) - Hello and welcome to another episode of I Love It Here, where we try and support you with little nuggets of insight through our conversations that we have with amazing people. Your host today, myself, Caleb Foster, Paul Westlake, and our roving reporter Jonathan Cooper. And I'm really pleased to welcome our guest along Sophie Costin from Make Real. So without further ado, let's have a great chat. And Sophie, for those that may not know you, tell us a little bit about yourself, what you do, why you do it, etcetera.

Speaker 3 (00:01:00) - Yeah, of course. So I am learning designer by trade. I very much cut my teeth in kind of digital learning design and consultancy as well. But I moved over to Make Real, which is where I'm currently director of Learning in 2019. And one of the reasons I wanted to come across, other than they're a great group who do great work, was I was really interested to see whether all those kind of best practices that we really understand in the digital learning space how that applies to an immersive learning environment.

Speaker 3 (00:01:35) - Can we just lift and shift them? Do we need to tweak any of those principles and that kind of thing? So I've been on this kind of journey of discovery for the last four years, I guess, in terms of how immersive learning design works.

Speaker 2 (00:01:47) - Wow. I think and I think we'll probably come back to, well, what is immersive learning? Why should we take note about it, you know, and all the lovely stuff. I think what I'd love to start off with before we get into that conversation is our gratitude for, you know, the recent what what's happened recently. So I'm going to hand that straight back to you. Sophie, what gratitude can you share with our audience?

Speaker 3 (00:02:16) - Yeah. I'm always so grateful for the people around me. You know, the networks that you move in are everything. I think, like all my resilience and I've needed quite a bit of resilience lately, and any success I've had is very much down to other people, I think. And there's been a few points in the last few weeks I really needed the best people around me and I very much have the best people around me.

Speaker 3 (00:02:43) - So that's what I'm grateful for. Wow.

Speaker 2 (00:02:46) - I think that's so we've spoken quite a lot on how we record gratitude. And I said consistently what I'm seeing is a theme in my gratitude moments about connecting with people, having great conversations and leaning into that. And and again, that really resonates with me actually, because not not only through, you know, challenging times, but just to pick up the phone and know there's people there that you can go, Oh, can I mow this over with you? And that you'll get honest information and feedback.

Speaker 3 (00:03:21) - Yeah. And not just being able to pick up the phone. Like those moments when other people pick up the phone to you and they preempt that. Like, that's so special. And yeah, I don't know. I don't know who I'd be without that. So that's my gratitude.

Speaker 2 (00:03:37) - What about you, Caleb? You've got a couple this month. Well, I my gratitude mainly revolves around foraging. And I was thinking I've already I'm sure I've already done this, but.

Speaker 2 (00:03:53) - Right. So how often do you just walk down the road and ignore what's around you? You don't see it. And the gratitude that I had the other month and I posted it on LinkedIn as well, is we're watching something on the TV about elderflower champagne. Well, you know, we were we were wandering around the village trying to find elder flowers and didn't have much luck. And literally ten meters from our house is a big grain that's got an abundance of elder flowers. And we must have walked past it every day, three times a day. So this this evening, after we'd watch this program, we just picked them up and we've started making elderflower champagne, which I can't wait to try. So are they going to be lovely or bloody awful? Um, and then also, so we've got this lovely apple tree in our garden, which they're all just about ready. But we went, we walked down the pub the other week on a Saturday and there was loads of blackberries just on the way to the pub.

Speaker 2 (00:04:59) - So of course we did the usual thing was picking them and eating them and said, You know what, we need to come back tomorrow and pick a load. We ended up getting about £6 of blackberries and making some crumble and freezer load. So sometimes it's just about having a look around and there's an abundance of stuff on your doorstep that you can use.

Speaker 3 (00:05:22) - My my best friend got married last weekend, and she is known amongst our circles as being like the foraging queen. We once went on a barge holiday and we just ate like kings. Like she can do anything with porridge by just like what she finds around her. And actually, one of the things I was trying to get into my background is the bouquet I had. It's the bridesmaid. And she just foraged all these flowers the day before and she spent like £25 on flowers in the end because she bought like a few like roses and that kind of thing that she couldn't for it. But she had all these amazing bouquets, like so beautiful and it just come from the world around her.

Speaker 3 (00:05:58) - Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's a skill.

Speaker 4 (00:06:00) - That's awesome.

Speaker 2 (00:06:04) - What about you, Jonathan?

Speaker 4 (00:06:06) - I. I think I might be getting dull. I think this might be the second time I've had the same gratitude. I can't remember whether in the last episode I was grateful for whether I was grateful for my Brompton or not. I think I probably was, but I'm even more grateful for it. So so it's it's become a bit of a. I don't know. I'm completely obsessed with this bike now. So coming away, as we have done this live this last week, Friday was a Friday was a full day of work. I was out of the house from from Wednesday until until Friday. So when I got back on Friday afternoon, it was a case of just packing the car really quickly in order to get away at 7:00 and get here. So I threw the threw the bike in the back through the Brompton and behind the seat. If it had meant putting the roof bars on and going through all of that rigmarole, it just wouldn't have.

Speaker 4 (00:06:57) - It just wouldn't have happened. I just lifted it and put it in the car, although I've only been out on it a couple of times during the course of the week. It's been in the in the in a period of time where I'd normally have gone for a walk. So an hour, an hour. And just because it's electric and tiny, I've been able to get much further and see much more than I would have done in those in those two hours on each occasion. And driving around here has been just beautiful. So the other day I went out and was was riding very quiet country lanes with the occasional little kind of chocolate box cottage. And it's because it's the we're down near the new forest. Yeah, there were horses and cows grazing freely on either side of the road. It was just it was just wonderful. So that little bike is giving me these these incredible moments of pleasure. So I'm really grateful for that. I love that, Jonathan.

Speaker 2 (00:07:47) - I love the fact.

Speaker 4 (00:07:48) - That it hasn't waned and the fact that we are still talking about it.

Speaker 2 (00:07:51) - What.

Speaker 4 (00:07:51) - Two months later and hopefully I'm just going to get better and better. Right? Yeah, I hope so. I hope it is going to be. And I think I've said before, I look forward to those moments of getting out on it. And because it's becoming such a part of part of my daily life. Um, it's providing me pleasure every week, even on workdays, I get these little windows where I can, where I'm cycling between cycling between clients, and I'm getting half an hour where I feel 12 again, cycling around this tiny little bike and going really fast and going down canal towpath. And it's it's a real it's a real mental break. It's brilliant. I love it. Really, really love it. And I've become incredibly boring about it and will continue to be. So.

Speaker 2 (00:08:33) - You know what you need, Jonathan, is a little basket on the front so he can go foraging. Every time that you go out and your Brompton.

Speaker 4 (00:08:41) - There is, there is a bag.

Speaker 4 (00:08:42) - So I have my recent purchase was was a bag for the front. My recent budget was the bag for the front and so I've now got the big bag so I can I don't have to have a rucksack, but there is there is a there is a bag without or without pockets out of speak, just like a crate that you can buy for the front which will be going to ask for that for my birthday.

Speaker 2 (00:09:09) - And you can say that sounds like a Christmas present to me.

Speaker 4 (00:09:13) - Yeah, yeah. First that comes before Christmas time, so I might get it in then. What about me? Well, sorry to bring it all down a little bit, but I had one of those. No, I'll do. I'll do a couple, but I'll end on a hi. There we go. So unfortunately, last week was, um. We had a funeral last week, so it's my uncle's funeral. Um, and I know this sounds bizarre because we go to funerals for, like, my dad's got quite a big family on his side, but it's the first sort of close family member, if that makes sense.

Speaker 4 (00:09:49) - And it was my dad's getting on a bit and, you know, you could see he was getting stressed trying to sort everything out. And my uncle didn't have any close family as in wasn't married, didn't have kids and all the rest of it. So it's sort of thrown in my direction a little bit. And I sort of stepped up and said, You know what? You don't need to deal with this. I'll deal with this. So anyway, what was my gratitude was it was such a fun loving guy that a funeral didn't seem like a traditional funeral in quotes, didn't seem right. It was very much going to be a celebration. He was, you know, very much every weekend he'd be out in Belgium or France taking photos of mountain biking and all of the rest of it. So he was touring around following all of that good stuff. He used to be a rally car driver and I mean just a real cool uncle as I remember him, and nothing really changed. Anyway, so I found this guy and this is what I'm grateful for.

Speaker 4 (00:10:44) - We found a celebrant rather than a sort of funeral director. And this guy just basically took all of this information. He and I worked quite closely together writing, I say the service, but it wasn't really a service. It was more sort of a celebration thing. I had to do a I didn't have to. I wanted to do like a speech, which I did at the at a ceremony we put together like a video slideshow and all of this stuff. But what I was most grateful for, we didn't know how many people were going to turn up and we were expecting like 20, 30, whatever, 118 people turned up standing room only, all around the edge. It was absolutely fascinating. And afterwards, people outside going, Well, I only knew Rich Richard. That was his name. I only knew him between this this time and this time. And I knew about the rally driver, but I had no idea that he did the photography and other people going. He used to be a rally car driver.

Speaker 4 (00:11:33) - I didn't know any of that. And it was so lovely to hear all those people from all those different sort of parts of his life. But what was really lovely was I got chatting to a group of 6 or 7 guys, probably about his age, so sort of early 70s and they went, Yeah, we're the Monday club. And I said, Well, what's the Monday club? And he went, Oh, we were all apprentices together in what GPO then? British Telecom, basically, where my uncle worked originally we were all apprentices together and yeah, I think we've missed two ever. I said, What do you mean? He said, Well, we go for a beer every every Monday night, which is why it's called the Monday Club and we've been doing that for over 50 years. It was oh, it was so, so stunning. And one of the guys said, Oh, I live in France. And I said, Well, you don't come over. Every week goes, No, but once a month.

Speaker 4 (00:12:20) - And I thought, you know what? I it was just, you know, when you suddenly think this is what it's all about, there was always people saying, this is what it's all about. It was so sorry to bring it down and talk about a funeral. But at the same time, it was I was so grateful for how many. And following on from that, how many people have said, absolutely love the service. You absolutely nailed it. You know everything you said. Yeah, you described him. It was massively a celebration. Sorry, Caleb. I interrupted you, mate.

Speaker 2 (00:12:52) - No, no, was just the word funeral does give it a negative connotation now because that is synonymous with, you know, obviously mourning, feeling sad. But yeah, and again, each to their own right. It's a personal decision. I love the idea of a celebration of life, and it does connect quite well to a lot of books. I've been listening to just recently that say when you're defining either your business culture or what's your personal purpose, just think.

Speaker 2 (00:13:25) - What would you want people to say about you at your funeral? Yeah, because you know, and like, I want to be the cool uncle. Like when when people come to mine, right? And I want it to be a celebration. So if that's what you want the narrative to be towards the end, you need to make that happen and live that in an authentic way during your life. And you can't just switch it on and off. And and that's probably why so many people came to that. Um, that celebration is because it was authentic to that, whether you knew about it or not.

Speaker 4 (00:14:02) - No, honestly, mate, you're absolutely spot on. And it just. It just summarised him. It was all about him, you know, and the music we play, but stuff that he'd like. So that was really good. I've got one more, if I may. Follow me on trumpet a little bit. And it was very, very much a I was so surprised as you were so to be asked to be interviewed and then featured on Day One's blog for How I used day one to record my Gratitudes.

Speaker 4 (00:14:33) - So I shared that with you, didn't I? It was like.

Speaker 2 (00:14:36) - A smoothie and.

Speaker 4 (00:14:37) - It sounds so good.

Speaker 2 (00:14:39) - Where's the influencer?

Speaker 4 (00:14:41) - No, it was really. Oh, I don't know about that, mate, but honestly, I tell you what I did find though. This isn't journalism wonderful. As in they asked me a few questions here and the article she wrote, I'm thinking, I'm not sure I said exactly that, but it was properly sort of bulked out. And I thought, Could you make me sound really good? But what it did do, which I am grateful for, is it made me think, yeah, I need to keep doing this. So I need to keep recording those gratitudes in day one like it did. And this time of year in particular, it's sort of kids summer holidays and all the rest of it. Every day. At the moment I'm getting between, say, five and ten memories from previous years and you look through them each day with the kids and it's like 12 years ago we were in Ibiza.

Speaker 4 (00:15:28) - Nine years ago we were in Alton Towers. Five years ago we were in Cornwall and seeing those holiday photos and what we did each day and all of the rest of it absolutely worth it. So if you're wondering, do I get into this gratitude recording thing or not, trust me. Further down the line, when the kids have grown up a bit and you want to look back and think, what were we doing ten years ago? It's absolutely genius. So there you go. That's no more Caleb. I've done two, three.

Speaker 2 (00:15:53) - So. Oh, good, I, I know that we talk about recording gratitudes a lot and that's what we try and start with. But the more people that you connect with and speak to about it, it's not a new thing. It almost feels like it's a hidden thing sometimes and people do it and and don't share that they do it. You know, I think the more people that we can say actually, it's a great way of articulating your thoughts whether to yourself or sharing them as we do.

Speaker 2 (00:16:28) - But it it, you know, helps you get through some tough challenges and reflect on the stuff that you have done and not dwell on the stuff that you haven't done or that's dragging you down. It's a real positive spin on stuff.

Speaker 4 (00:16:42) - Absolutely. It's the ultimate balancer for me. And that's what I said in that interview, I think, which is, you know what, every time you have a bit of a bad day and every time, just just look at what you have achieved. And that's the bit we're not so good at. You know, is looking back and going, well, actually this was a bit of a pain, but look at all these things that went well. It just I think part of that's being British, mate, if I'm honest, you know. So you do eight GCSEs, you know, if seven of them are A's and one of them would be, you know, B's a shame, you know, that's just the way we are, which is nuts. Right? But we need to change that.

Speaker 4 (00:17:16) - So there you go. Anyway, I'd love to get into a thousand questions for Sophie about, um. What I'm going to use a vision pro for when my apple Apple delivery arrives.

Speaker 3 (00:17:30) - But have you pre-ordered pre-order.

Speaker 4 (00:17:34) - Coming to money I don't know about?

Speaker 3 (00:17:36) - No.

Speaker 4 (00:17:38) - Can we? Yeah. And by the way, if my wife is listening to us, that was a total up with no way on earth. I'm paying that sort of money.

Speaker 2 (00:17:46) - For things said in jest and all that. It's in the post.

Speaker 3 (00:17:53) - Do you want to go? Yeah, as a studio, I'm sure. I'm sure we're going to scare one up. We've all got to have a go. I really want to watch a film in one. I think that looks really exciting.

Speaker 4 (00:18:04) - The trying to position it definitely don't. So. So rather than being I think they're trying to didn't aren't they call something like a wearable computer rather than sort of a VR headset or something. Is that just the apple way trying to put spin on it or.

Speaker 3 (00:18:19) - Well, I mean, it's just not a virtual reality headset because you can see through like that's the whole thing is that you're supposed to have all this, you know, it is more augmented. Reality is.

Speaker 2 (00:18:29) - Stuff like.

Speaker 3 (00:18:30) - The HoloLens and it's, you know. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Very much that. I mean, the thing with the HoloLens and I think the HoloLens is great, the price point for that is quite prohibitive as well, but it's quite boxy. Like it's just this tiny little field of view. But what Apple seem to have really worked on is getting it so that it's really engaging with the environment. It's not just this little letterbox view where you can see digital things projected in this tiny field of view. It's like you almost wouldn't be able to tell the difference between. Where the digital world ends and where the physical world begins. I mean, obviously we've just seen marketing material.

Speaker 4 (00:19:08) - Fascinating, right? So, well, firstly, I thought you could see through it.

Speaker 4 (00:19:12) - And obviously it's not. It's taking pictures of your eyes and then projecting it on the front. So it looks like people could see your eyes because I think they were saying they don't they want other people to sort of interact with you still whilst you're using this thing. So that was first and foremost.

Speaker 2 (00:19:27) - Hold on.

Speaker 4 (00:19:28) - No idea.

Speaker 2 (00:19:29) - Just explain that for me because that sounds really creepy that they're taking photos of your eyes and projecting them somewhere. Just elaborate on that for me.

Speaker 4 (00:19:37) - Absolutely. No, no, no fun. So if you think of think of putting on a normal Sophie, please correct me when I'm wrong. I was going to say if, but so yeah, it's got cameras on the inside of. So you imagine you're putting it on and imagine the front of an existing sort of VR headset. It's just basically like white plastic, for example, on the Vision Pro, the front is actually a screen not watching a TV, but what it's actually showing on that screen is the pictures it's taken of your face and your eyes and then putting it on the screen so that someone you're talking to can see your eyes, see you blink, see you looking around.

Speaker 4 (00:20:14) - So to them, it looks like it's transparent, if that makes sense. It looks like it's but it's not. So, so so when you've seen it doesn't.

Speaker 2 (00:20:21) - Look like just a big brick.

Speaker 4 (00:20:22) - On your face, do you think?

Speaker 3 (00:20:25) - Right. I mean, it's really like one of the key.

Speaker 4 (00:20:28) - I thought you could see through it. And I thought, well, that's kind of cool. But no, it's not. It's completely doing that in real time and projecting what it's looking at. All of these cameras in you on the front screen. I've got that right there.

Speaker 3 (00:20:39) - Sophie You have? Yeah. One of the key developments is just how thin it is. You know, even the the quests are getting really, really thin now. Like the Oculus three will be the quest three will be not Oculus anymore. Meta Quest three will be released soon. And even that's really thin. The meta Quest Pro has got a lot thinner that's really comfortable to wear as well. I really like it, but it is very much a visor on your face.

Speaker 3 (00:21:02) - And the Quest Pro is quite an interesting one because it has the pass through. It's still very much virtual reality, but it has much better. It's called passthrough camera. So you can see the room. So as the wearer you feel really like you're in the room, you're chatting away. But I very quickly realized I was making everyone feel really uncomfortable when I was chatting to them because they're looking at someone with a big visor on their head and it doesn't look like you can see them. So they're a bit confused as to how you interacting with them and how much of you they can see and how much of they Yeah, the other way around. Whereas yeah, the vision pro is it's super slim, you know, think like data from Star Trek or, or a more up to date reference and yet they've done the marketing material really cleverly. So it absolutely looks like it's just like you're wearing ski glasses and you can see through but it's not. And obviously I haven't seen one in the flesh, so I don't know how much it is marketing material and how much it is.

Speaker 3 (00:21:55) - Actually, when you see it, it just feels like having a conversation to the person. So what can we.

Speaker 2 (00:21:59) - Do in your WhatsApp group when you get one in the studio? So we get first dibs on having a go.

Speaker 3 (00:22:05) - Yeah, come on round, come around. Yeah, definitely. Yeah. We'll be, we'll be making a lot of friends that month I think.

Speaker 4 (00:22:13) - I think it's going to be us only to start with though. Right So but then I think if nothing else for your industry, the very fact that someone like Apple are getting involved, that's only going to accelerate things, surely, because they tend to wait. Right. And they look at what's around and then they just and then they bring to be fair, they bring out what everyone else had about two years ago, but slightly better. But everyone goes, oh, apple in a.

Speaker 3 (00:22:37) - Cooler. I think that's the important thing. Apple are cool. People want their stuff You know there was there were Nokias, there were BlackBerry mobiles and stuff beforehand, but they weren't cool.

Speaker 3 (00:22:47) - And then Apple came and made it cool. And yeah, I think Matt has been doing some really good hard work at driving adoption. I think Apple are going to swan in and make it cool. That might be that might be the thing.

Speaker 4 (00:23:00) - From what I understand they. Taken in a different direction. Have no slightly to all of the others. Is it fair to say and I know you use all this stuff for learning. It's very much what your thing, but I think a lot of people saw them as like gaming type devices, whereas Apple was saying, no, no, that's why if I'm working away in a hotel, you know, I'm not going to carry two big monitors around with me and I can't do it. But you know what? If I can carry this thing and put this on and all of a sudden I've got that, I've got infinite space, if you like, and I can still do my work. And I'm not convinced that that's going to work for me. As in, I'm ever going to be in a position where I carry this thing around and think, Oh, well, I don't need to bring a laptop anymore.

Speaker 4 (00:23:43) - I can work on this. But you've got to bear in mind this is a 1.0 device that's just going to get better and better and better and cheaper and quicker. Much as you look at the original iPhone now compared with what we've got. So maybe that is going to work. And they're saying, yeah, but you don't need. It doesn't need to be either or because you've got the pass through thing. I can work on my laptop and at the same time. I can then sort of look up and see another screen over there.

Speaker 3 (00:24:08) - And that exists now though. So the meta Quest Pro is a really good bit of kit if you can get your hands on one. They're a little bit more pricey than the meta quest two or soon to be three, but that already exists. You scan in your work place, you scan in your workstation, and it maps where your keyboard is. You see a virtual representation of your keyboard and you can see then a recast version of your screens. And so you get more real estate.

Speaker 3 (00:24:34) - So I haven't done it much, but Robin, who's the MD at Make Real, he spends a fair amount of time working, working in the metaverse, you know, and being able to spread out a little bit more while you have a sort of smaller desk and that kind of thing. So it's here and now and people are using it, but it's that mass adoption thing that I think will be interesting with the Apple device. Yeah.

Speaker 4 (00:24:57) - Sorry, Caleb, I appreciate I'm monopolizing this conversation, but as soon as we saw Sophie was coming on, I was thinking, oh, my way, I could do three hours on it. Talk to me about your concerns or how how people are reacting to what you've just described there, which is. So we went from sitting in an office talking to each other and standing at a watercooler and all of the rest of it. And then we went to hear We better all work online. And we were chatting to each other via teams and zoom and everything else instead.

Speaker 4 (00:25:27) - And now we're getting to the point where are we expected to now be putting on headsets and going off to some completely different and not even being our selves and being avatars and stuff and people genuinely doing that? Are they working in what we call this metaverse?

Speaker 3 (00:25:42) - We are. So we are to some extent it's not right for everything, but we have say like a monthly meeting. So every two weeks we have a whole team stand up and we'll have like a guest speaker in or do a bit of knowledge share or do a walkthrough of a project that we've just recently finished or something like that. And sometimes that's really appropriate to do on teams, especially if it's a walkthrough of a project that we've done. We want to share some screenshots and da da da, but sometimes we just want to feel like we're in the same space and we're not, you know, like most people are still based down in Brighton. But during the pandemic we took on a lot of hires. People sort of moved as well up to Yorkshire.

Speaker 3 (00:26:19) - We took on hires in London and the Southwest as well. So we're everywhere and it's really nice. We all have a headset. I've got mine here. Like this is literally part of my desk. This is my meta quest two and this is part of my desk setup. It's just there and we'll stick a headset on and we'll go and meet in the metaverse. What is the metaverse? Well, sometimes we meet in spatial IO, which is like just environments. There's some functionality, but it's just a platform where you can all hang out, you can hear people's voices, you can kind of see their body language as well because it's mapped to their movements. So you get a much better sense. I think it's much more like intuitive body language than when you're on a teams call and you feel a bit conspicuous. People really relax and you can hear spatial audio. So if you're stood near someone, you can have a conversation. If there's someone over there, you can't hear them, you've got to move towards them.

Speaker 3 (00:27:11) - We do that sometimes. We play walkabout. Mini golf really recommend it. Really very good. And I also really like that sometimes we if there's nothing like serious to discuss on a project, we just want a project update. We'll go into Walkabout Mini Golf and you'll chat about the projects and challenges you've had whilst putting. And I think it's hilarious that like so much business has done on the golf course and then we're there in a virtual mini golf course, like it's okay about really like that. It's really subversive.

Speaker 4 (00:27:39) - Yeah, You tend to get you tend to chat and open open up more when you're walking and having a conversation anyway, right? So I guess that makes that's, that's really cool. I really like that.

Speaker 3 (00:27:51) - One of the courses is this Cherry Blossom course and it's got this Japanese feel and I feel so relaxed afterwards like it is. So it is like this kind of meditative space. Yeah. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And you really feel like you stood next to people on the team, whereas I never feel like that after a team score.

Speaker 2 (00:28:09) - I think that's really important, though, isn't it, that I'm just trying to play devil's advocate, so I'm super into tech and I would take anything if it was new, whether it was proven to work or not. But now I'm in my mind, I'm playing devil's advocate to go, what's what's stopping mass adoption with this? Like, what are the inhibitors and why do we hear so many people go, Yeah, that's okay for that business or that environment? And just the stuff that you said there, it's so we're missing at the minute. Some of the feeling and emotions and connections that we used to have working with people directly in an office. And we've we've sort of gone completely the other way because global circumstances dictated that. We've now applied a load of lessons learnt from that and we're finding a balance in the middle and we still haven't got it. But we're um, I mean teams, I hate to say is an old technology, but it's, it's sort of a modern way just to get everyone, you know, looking at a monitor.

Speaker 2 (00:29:18) - But it's not immersive. And this is that blend then, isn't it? But the next step has got to be how do I then make it really easy and not cumbersome because that's one of the barriers to adoption. So I know from having our own Oculus Quest, you know, it's heavy. It weighs on your face. You look an idiot when you're standing there in a room and you're the only one. And if we can get to a point where it's just like picking up a pair of glasses and then it's fully immersive and it's easy because we are lazy by nature, we will do the thing that causes a less friction. And then we can start blending. How does that make me feel? Connected to all of my work colleagues? In a better way. That means I can also balance my life commitments and my work commitments. I'm not having to travel for three hours down the motorway just to be in a physical office.

Speaker 3 (00:30:18) - Yeah, Yeah. I think there's a few things. Like one thing that we've really noticed is this this kind of mindset of like, well, of course we can't give everyone headsets like when we're working on a project.

Speaker 3 (00:30:29) - The assumption is always that, you know, of course we'll just get ten, but no company ever thinks that about laptops. They think like, Oh, you're all going to need to share laptops. And really, price point wise, it's a fraction of the cost of a So this is kind of this mindset of, well, of course we can't at the moment. And so what's going to happen to to unstick that? I think there's various like baby steps so we use baseline is one of the platforms that we use to to meet in the metaverse headset is well actually I quite like it on desktop anyway headset is the the full fat version of it, but it's multi-platform so you can go in on, um, on desktop and there's something about spatial i o on desktop. I really quite like it kind of, it looks a bit like a video game, you know, you're looking at a screen and you're moving around the screen, but I don't know, I always feel more like I've been in a room with someone when when I've used it versus teams.

Speaker 3 (00:31:31) - But it's really easy, you know, it's just a link there. You get an avatar. It's kind of fun. You can explore around. It makes you really curious. So I think like that multi-platform thing is going to be really good for those baby steps to like normalize 3D computing, basically, like being used to being in a 3D space. And then from there, headset stuff is.

Speaker 4 (00:31:51) - People like teams in that are trying to do that as well, aren't they though? I mean, so I saw an update for teams this week, um, which has added spatial audio. So we have that in FaceTime, but I'd love for us all to use FaceTime, but in reality I'm the only Mac user in our business and everyone else just glazes over and goes, you know, I dunno what you're talking about. We use teams despite them all having iPhones. Right? But anyway, I kind of get it because they're on Windows PCs. But, but the spatial audio thing with teams is quite interesting.

Speaker 4 (00:32:19) - So with the what I called airpod pros on, you can hear the sounds now coming from where those people are on your screen. So if you've got eight people on the screen and one of them's top right, the sound comes from top right now. I know that sounds bizarre, but it actually makes sense. It sounds like a conversation is going on within the room. So I hear Caleb to my left and I can hear Sophie to my right. And you know, Jonathan, I can hear the background because he's in his car. But it's that sort of thing where. I think they're trying to make it. They're trying to catch up. Almost, as you say, these baby steps, you could see where that's going to go. So it won't be long before I'm sure I will be able to put on a headset of some sort and join teams like that. Maybe. I don't I don't know. I can see where it's all going.

Speaker 3 (00:33:03) - Yeah, exactly.

Speaker 4 (00:33:04) - But you're right. The I think the biggest problem that part of the industry has is that, as I say, up until now, it's been perceived as a gaming thing, whereas it's so much more than that.

Speaker 4 (00:33:15) - So I think the useful learning for me has always been got loads of potential. But whenever you went to learn tech, you know, 4 or 5 years ago, it'd be, Oh, I've got a VR headset. Well that's nice. What are you using it for? Yeah, well nothing yet, but you know, but there must be lots of situations where you are using that, you know, and where you can. I don't know. I think the classic was training people how to use an oil rig, for example, or how to work on an oil rig or or dangerous situations or that sort of stuff, rather than doing a bit of e-learning, don't click here because you're going to die, you know, putting them in a position where they've got a headset on and going, Blimey, you know, I'm sure, I'm sure it was make a short demo of news about working that height. Yeah, I'm really not a very good I'm not very good with heights. I'm really not.

Speaker 4 (00:34:04) - I'd actually made me feel quite. Well, hold on. I'm near the edge. No, no piece of e-learning is ever going to do that, right? It's just not. Whereas that for me is where I think there's a huge potential for this sort of thing because it adds adds almost like another level. It adds like feeling to it rather than, you know, I mean not just emotional feeling, but that sort of physical feeling, I guess immersive learning.

Speaker 3 (00:34:28) - I think, you know, if I was to define what immersive learning is, it is all about re-engaging the emotional context of the learning requirement, which most digital learning doesn't do. It's not that it can't do it. And I think things like Drama for learning goes a lot of that way. But there's certainly been a number of times I've been in a headset and about to do something where I feel like, Oh, I don't think I can do this. I don't think I'm ready. And I've never clicked on a piece of learning and had that same visceral reaction.

Speaker 3 (00:34:59) - Interestingly, with the it was Vodafone working at heights that was actually made for the people who book, the people who work at Heights. So not for the people who work at heights themselves, although it was sold out. So but it was it was yeah, it was an empathy piece. Like this is what you're asking people to do when you squeeze all these jobs together and you give people ten minutes and you get people rushing, this is what you're asking them to rush How does that feel? Like that? Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I think as an industry, you know, this whole physical safety piece makes so much sense on paper. That's very much where the industry rushed. But I think that's quite naive in a way, like it's absolutely a legitimate use of, of the technology. But I think it was those first steps of getting used to it. If you look at the academic space where virtual reality has been used for 20, 30 years, more, more maybe they're not researching.

Speaker 3 (00:35:53) - They're not researching, using virtual technology, how to make people more physically safe. They're researching how to make people more psychologically safe using this technology. And it's very well understood, well proven technology in academic circles. And I think the learning and development industry is really just scratching the surface of of what's already known and what's already proven out there in terms of psychological safety and virtual reality.

Speaker 4 (00:36:21) - Can we pick up on that a little bit, Sophia, if I'm sure I saw if it wasn't you, it's you've got you've got a double somewhere. I'm sure I saw you at the This Can Happen awards a few months back I'm sure I'm sure you the side of the room I'm sure Sophie and I know I know so but that that for and again fill in the blanks for me but that's all about mental health and psychologically safe and that's basically what so where does make real and this immersive stuff fit into that. I mean it's is it suitable for you know, for changing someone's opinions or what are you using that for? Why were you there?

Speaker 3 (00:37:00) - It's hugely suitable for for that kind of topic.

Speaker 3 (00:37:03) - And like I say in academic circles, in terms of virtual realities, ability to let you live as another, and that will then impact how you think and feel about the world. Because, you know, virtual reality is great for simulating lived experiences and your brain reacts like it's having a lived experience, which means then when you take your headset off, your behaviour continues to adapt and continues to change as though you have had a lived experience. So there's a lot of research around its ability to reduce bias, racial bias. So there's a big study by University of Barcelona in terms of empathy, you know, sort of that phrase, the empathy machine was bandied around a lot about five years ago, but it's very well proven to be able to increase empathy and. Amongst participants who've tried it. So what we produce for that, that was a piece we did with Lloyds Banking Group and it was on mental health, obviously, because it was this can happen, but it was about having the conversation and not avoiding a conversation with a colleague in distress, and that was actually desktop based.

Speaker 3 (00:38:04) - So it was a simulation. So, you know, immersive isn't one thing. From my perspective, immersive is re-engaging emotion in learning. And when you're emotionally engaged, that's when I would consider it immersive. So it was actually, yeah, simulation of a video call. So it was accessing your device's webcam and audio and you were drawn in, you know, like it was a team score. You were there on the screen and there was an actor who calls you up and says, I'm having a really hard time. And I just didn't know how else to speak to. And you can speak aloud. You can say anything in, the actor responds and you go and then you get to watch yourself back. You get to step into the other person's shoes. And then there's coaching tips on screen as to, you know, these are some common mistakes. Did you make any of these? This is what good looks like. How does your response compare and you sort of self assess and self, right? And that was actually subject to an academic study in its own right and academic came along and and did two samples, one on Lloyds Banking Group employees and one in the general population, general UK population, and compared to a baseline of traditionally learning.

Speaker 3 (00:39:08) - And they found that people were twice as likely to take action as a result of doing this immersive simulation versus people who did traditional e-learning so fantastic. You're not to.

Speaker 4 (00:39:19) - Love it because it's all empathy thing, isn't it? You know how people feel. Go ahead, Caleb.

Speaker 2 (00:39:25) - No, I'll just. When I was speaking to Sophie last week, we were also talking about location based events, which is quite close to Sophia's heart as well. And I just wanted to sort of tease that out a little bit and find out a bit more and and how that could work.

Speaker 3 (00:39:44) - I really want to do one. That's job number one. So I'm just telling everybody until eventually someone goes, Oh, I got some budget here under this sofa. But so location based events is like, it might happen. You never know. I just find if you keep saying something, eventually it does happen, so I'm just going to keep saying it. And location based events is a funny term. I only really came across it in the last few years, but it's a really burgeoning industry and I think we've probably all experienced it.

Speaker 3 (00:40:10) - But we didn't know we were going to an as it's called. So things like Van Gogh Alive has been doing the rounds. It's just made it to Brighton and, you know, things like that. There was a Dali experience that me and the director of sales here went to in London. There's a bit of research, which is nice. Yeah, it's great, isn't it?

Speaker 4 (00:40:29) - Absolutely loved it. And it's possibly the we loved it all. And then we got to the headset bit at the end and my wife went, Oh, I don't know if I'm going to like this. And within about five minutes she was absolutely all over it. It was the best use of it I've ever seen.

Speaker 3 (00:40:43) - Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 4 (00:40:44) - And it's when you then take the headset off at the end and you look at how small a bit you're walking around was. Yeah, but these were, these were. Sorry I've massively interrupted you there, but these were like, um, they've done like diver's helmets because it looked like you were under the sea.

Speaker 4 (00:40:58) - So you can see each person, you know, just by the sort of diver's helmets, honestly, it was anyway, so. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (00:41:05) - And you were walking around Dali painting.

Speaker 4 (00:41:07) - The Dali experience it.

Speaker 3 (00:41:09) - Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So they're really increasing. And as a business, you know, probably 80% of what we do is learning. But there's also quite healthy bit of business, 20% of the business that's fun and games. That's not my bit of the business. Unfortunately. I do the serious stuff, not the funny games. I've got a very talented man called Jeff Cullen who does all the fun and games, but you know, I think was back in 2019, we first got this enquiry about a karting project and we were like, What's that? Was this? And then we've become probably one of the foremost companies in the country doing, you know, projection mapping for karting experiences. So we did a Mario Kart experience. I think that was 2021. And yeah, we went from having this sort of weird inquiry in 2019 to 1 project on the go.

Speaker 3 (00:41:55) - And now I think we've got about five karting experiences on the go. So it's just really exploded so much fun. Like it's just put so much joy and energy in a room. I'm not suggesting go karting for learning yet. Maybe I am, we don't know. But I just think it solves so many problems. It taps into a like guy's novelty is good for learning. I think there's that. I think we need to acknowledge it and sort of bracket it and put that out of the way. But I think there's this other thing that there's so much office space and there's so many employers trying to get people back into the office and then people go there and no one from their team is there. It's just someone they don't know and they've commuted all this way. And why am I here? There's all this unused real estate. If we could use some of that to create an experience that's going to make people feel differently, think differently about something like diversity, inclusion. I think that would be such a great area.

Speaker 3 (00:42:48) - You know, tell stories with projection mapping, you know, make it feel like you're in a room where you're the only one who looks like you and everyone else. That's different. We can create that in a physical space that's going to change the way you feel about the people that you work with and what a great use of that space that would be. So that's why someone needs to find some budget down the back of the sofa. We need to do something.

Speaker 4 (00:43:18) - It's just the scope is massive when you start to think about exactly that. So. Have they still got the technology improved so that people don't feel a bit queasy wearing some of the headsets and stuff? And I'm sure I'm sure Apple said again, back to the Vision Pro that the thing that that was causing that was the refresh rate on the screen. So it's basically you've got two very high resolution screens literally in front of your eyes. Right? That's exactly the way the thing works. So they were saying until that refresh rate was right, they had people that are finished and they can't have that.

Speaker 4 (00:43:54) - They can't have people feeling unwell, doing a pizza, learning or whatever it may be. So I presume technology's caught up with that.

Speaker 3 (00:44:00) - Technology's caught up. I think a lot of it is the design of it as well. You know, we get a lot of people coming over to us at, you know, Learning Technologies conference, various conferences. And then I oh, I tried Richie's plank experience where I tried a roller coaster. And no, it makes me feel sick. And it's like, well, that stuff's designed to make you feel sick. And it's all about locomotion, you know, like when your brain detects know when your eyes are feeding in movement that your body isn't detecting. Yeah. Then that that discrepancy makes you feel ill. Most of the experiences we design a seated experiences with a few notable exceptions like working at height, where you're actually using your hands to climb. But because there's no disconnect between the movement and your physical movement, that shouldn't make you feel sick if the refresh rate is is right.

Speaker 3 (00:44:48) - So yeah, it's I think a lot of it is about badly designed virtual reality, making people sick. There's also a sense of getting your legs as well. This is a term that people use, like you see legs and I think it is a slightly different way of interpreting the world, of inputting, you know, receiving data. And I think it does take your brain a little while to adjust. And I think you do adjust and you do get used to it.

Speaker 4 (00:45:14) - So. And are you are you having the same eyesight issues? But you know what I mean. Having been in this industry, probably not as long as me, because I'm quite an old git, but I've been around a while and what I mean by that is traditionally when we first had e-learning, people knew that that was dull. Read, click, next, read next. And then, you know, even 3 or 4 years later, things have moved on so much. But you've still got that. The minute you say e-learning, people glaze over and go, Oh God, this is going to be dull.

Speaker 4 (00:45:41) - So the original sort of VR experiences with some huge PC in the corner that was, you know, with fans going crazy and you're tethered to it and all of the rest of it. And it all felt a bit weird and bit blocky. Things have moved on so quickly from that. How do you make people come back and revisit and go, It's not what you're imagining.

Speaker 3 (00:46:02) - Yeah, that's a great question. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, seeing is believing with it and that's something I guess we've been sort of getting our heads around a little bit post-pandemic. People are very Home office based. Yeah. And so I just posted a headset to a lady in Ireland, for example, because it's like until you see this, I can't describe it to you, you know, it's because it is about the emotional journey of it. I really believe that. And I can't describe how this is going to make you feel. You need to feel that. Yeah. And so, yeah, I think I forgot what the actual question was.

Speaker 3 (00:46:35) - I think I'm about to go.

Speaker 2 (00:46:37) - Aren't you saying.

Speaker 4 (00:46:38) - People have got this happens all the time. People may have a preconceived idea of what what it is the technology is like, but the technology is way better than what they they thought. I Yeah, you know what I mean? If you dip your toe in early doors, it's a bit like, I don't know if I'd have bought one of the original, um, Nissan Leafs as a, as an electric car that had a range of about 60 miles and needed charging up, you know, every ten minutes. It bloomin awful. If I haven't experienced anything since, there's no way I'd buy an electric car now because in my head they're terrible, whereas they're way better than that now. You know what I mean? And it's almost having to get people to forget the previous experience and then get them back on board and you must be a bit like that. And the likes of Apple are going to help that because they're saying, no, no, it's there now when the technology is right and it's cool and all the rest of it.

Speaker 4 (00:47:26) - So I think people might need to go into this with a fresh pair of eyes rather than this preconceived idea based on what their previous experience was.

Speaker 3 (00:47:35) - Yeah, you're right. And the technology is changing so quickly. You know, if you tried something even two years ago that's not actually representative of where the industry is now. And, you know, to my point earlier about the industry was very much going down the route of physical safety to start off with because the business case for that is kind of obvious. Yeah, but increasingly it's the interpersonal skills, the soft skills area that's that's huge. And people were so dismissive of that sort of five years ago and people are starting to open up to it. And it's just by seeing really great examples, you know, you sort of buy what you can see I think is is is a true thing. So we do quite a lot of R&D pieces as well. You know, when we see an. It's unity. And we just need we need to make it real.

Speaker 3 (00:48:20) - We need to, you know, we need to have something that people can see this and understand it. We just create a little demo and that's very much part of our workflow and part of our thinking. Yeah, because it's it's asking too much of people, I think, to go imagine this, like when they don't have that experience, let's just make it, let's just do a proof of concept. And actually what we find is you can do quite a quick and dirty proof of concept in terms of the final sort of production standard that we'd like to get to. And it's still really blow people's minds because it's showing them something new. It's showing them a new way to be and interact and new things. So yeah, we do that a lot.

Speaker 2 (00:48:55) - I think the challenge that a lot of teams will have is a perception that it's going to cost them an awful lot of money as well. And and when they're just looking at costs rather than the benefits because you've already said about the uni of Barcelona doing the the the study and demonstrating the benefits it's going to pay off.

Speaker 2 (00:49:16) - So the the cost benefit is, you know, is there it's been documented and we always have a challenge with. You know, generating e-learning is when we're trying to put emotion and feeling into it. If you don't do that, then all you're doing is presenting information in a different way to what it was yesterday. And of course, no one's connecting with that content and it's not changing behavior. So, you know, if it's done right, then you're going to see the benefits across your organization. And again, some of those organizations have got to be in the same places as you and open minded to go. It's not just about a single piece of training. It's actually enhancing our culture and how we do stuff around here. And it's engaging people in the best way possible. So. I mean, there's a load of ways to slice up what what the cost impact might be, but it's about looking beyond that, I almost think.

Speaker 3 (00:50:19) - I started opening workshops by just kind of brainstorming, getting down.

Speaker 3 (00:50:24) - What's the value that you want to see from this piece of training? What is the return on investment? Even if, you know, don't worry about how we're going to measure it. So because once you get into that conversation, you know, there's a lot of barriers to actually measuring this stuff. But just think about where where is the value that this is going to generate? How is it going to generate value for let's know all that down and to just really reframe people's thoughts in terms of this could be an investment or this could be expensive. So this could be an investment. This is going to you know, this is going to bring value back into the business. This is going to bring savings ultimately is what it should be doing. And we always advocate starting with a little pilot as well, you know, a little proof of concept, invest just a small amount of money, the same sort of money that you would invest in in some e-learning and just try it out and see if you're getting the KPIs to suggest that you are getting that value back.

Speaker 3 (00:51:14) - And then by the time you've got to that point where it's sort of known and understood within the business, then it's a value generation piece as opposed to an expenditure.

Speaker 2 (00:51:31) - I want to know what's on your playlist currently. Sophie.

Speaker 3 (00:51:36) - Yeah. Nice. Yeah. You did warn me about this. You warn me about this question, and I, like, weirdly panicked. Like, it's a thing that I've been thinking about most, and I think I've identified that I have this weird corporate guilt that actually this year, I think I've read three things and I listen to podcasts as well. So there's like, you know, between sort of five and ten things that I've done that's like really work based. And then so much of it is about parenting because I've got an under two year old and I've got to learn.

Speaker 4 (00:52:09) - How to put your headset on all the time and hide.

Speaker 3 (00:52:13) - Exactly. So most of the stuff on my plate, on my playlist is around like gentle parenting techniques like Sarah Rockwell Smith and Philippa Perry and that kind of thing.

Speaker 3 (00:52:24) - And I think for a while I was trying to hide that and pretend that I was only reading really edifying books about corporate training. And then I decided to own it because I'm learning how to raise a human. And also that human is then going to go into the workforce. And I do think this whole gentle parenting wave is such a different way to look at raising a child. And that's going to have such a massive effect on who these people are in sort of 20 years time when they're entering the workforce, they'll have very different expectations as to what training and development should be. So we need to get on to it now. That's a feeling.

Speaker 2 (00:53:02) - In a nutshell. Then what? What is gentle parenting for for those that might not have heard the term before?

Speaker 3 (00:53:09) - Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 4 (00:53:11) - Like for you and I. Caleb.

Speaker 5 (00:53:13) - Well.

Speaker 3 (00:53:14) - I'll tell you what. It's not the antithesis of it is because I said so. Do this because I said so. So it's all about respecting the emotions of your child at any age.

Speaker 3 (00:53:27) - And, you know, like, I grew up in the 80s and 90s and there was so much around. Don't be silly. Don't be silly. You're overreacting. It doesn't matter. Don't be silly. You do not say that. In general, parenting, it matters to that person like they're a tiny, tiny, actual person who are learning how to be in this world. And you get down with them and you empathize and you go, I'm really sorry that that's so upsetting for you, but we can't let you have the kitchen knife right now. It's not safe. I know. It's really shiny. I know that looks so good, but I can't let you have that. Let's hug it out. And there's just so much kindness in it. I think it's such a nice approach. It's so difficult as well. Let's not get past that, because when a tiny human is screaming at you, you are still being screamed at, which is possibly never happened to you in your adult life. And if it has, then you'd be very justified to scream back at that other person.

Speaker 3 (00:54:19) - But instead you just need to censor yourself. And there's so much other stuff that goes into being the person that you need to be to be able to have those broad shoulders in that moment and go, I'm going to be the adult in this situation. I'm going to I'm going to contain your emotion. I'm going to reflect it back to you. I'm going to tell you what you're feeling so that we can work through it together. And it's this really big trend. Like even nurseries now are sort of really tapping into this gentle parenting, you know, the idea that discipline is linked to the act. So there's natural consequences to the act. So this whole thing of like grounding, taking away pocket money, none of that, none of that anymore, because it all needs to be linked like a consequence for the action. So you learn. So it's not confusing. So if you've like broken the best China, then being grounded isn't a direct consequence of that. Maybe getting a Saturday job to pay for it might be, but not just keeping them at home.

Speaker 3 (00:55:15) - And so like nurseries and schools are starting to really tap into this.

Speaker 2 (00:55:19) - Isn't isn't this then in the world of business, isn't this the same as managing versus leading stroke coaching that it's the same? So it's about empathizing with with your team, engaging with your team, involving your team, allowing them to make, you know, enabling them to make decisions, etcetera. The the parallels between gentle parenting and coaching in word is pretty much the same. And yet again, those those parents that are saying what's this gentle parenting malarkey are getting similar responses to those people in organizations that go this coaching in leadership as opposed to managing What's that all malarkey about? It's really short term thinking.

Speaker 5 (00:56:09) - Mm hmm.

Speaker 3 (00:56:10) - Yeah, definitely that. But yeah, I do really feel like because gentle parenting has been around a little while now, you know, at least over the last ten years, it's been very popular. So very soon we're going to have a lot of. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Very soon we're going to have a whole cohort of workforce who are just going to expect like that.

Speaker 4 (00:56:30) - Yeah, yeah. Having those conversations. And he used to.

Speaker 3 (00:56:35) - Do a demanding it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Who want to be treated like an adult and not someone who's being told what to do. I think like learning and delivery and that kind of thing. I'm so sure it's applied gentle parenting. I really hope so. And I think I think the world is getting kinder as well. Like, you know, there's all this stuff about the world's going to the dogs and that kind of thing. And in a lot of ways it is. But really, especially as a woman looking back at history, there's no time that I would want to be I want to be a professional and, you know, be in my adult life. And right here, right now, I think the world is getting kinder. And I take a lot of comfort from that.

Speaker 4 (00:57:14) - Lovely, really, really nice love that. And, you know, maybe there is hope for the future of leadership going, you know, future of the workplace.

Speaker 4 (00:57:22) - If leaders take that on board. That's brilliant. Thank you. So what about yourself, Kayla? What's on your playlist?

Speaker 2 (00:57:27) - Well, I'm not going to get all profound on you and tell you what I'm listening to, But I'll tell you what I've learned this this month, which is on my playlist, and I'm going to record it for next year as well. You must burp elderberry, elderflower champagne. What I mean by that is if you don't burp it, let go of the gas, it explodes in your kitchen and it makes quite a lot of mess.

Speaker 3 (00:57:59) - Did you learn that the hard way?

Speaker 2 (00:58:01) - Clearly did, yeah.

Speaker 3 (00:58:02) - Was that quite an immersive learning experience, that one?

Speaker 2 (00:58:05) - That was a learning moment. And I just thank God we weren't on holiday and thank God we were in the kitchen when it happened. Else that would have been quite messy to really clear up when we got home. So for those of you that really.

Speaker 4 (00:58:22) - Follow.

Speaker 2 (00:58:23) - And make champagne, make sure you burp it every day when it's in the bottles, don't make the mess.

Speaker 2 (00:58:29) - Did. Go, go.

Speaker 4 (00:58:32) - There you go.

Speaker 2 (00:58:34) - What about you? What's your playlist?

Speaker 4 (00:58:37) - Yeah. So mine are both what she sings. One of them slightly longer than the other. So the first one is I was desperately looking for something decent to watch, or so. And I stumbled across. It was on Amazon Prime. It's called that Peter Crouch movie. Now, I know you know the that Peter Crouch podcast, which I've never listened to. I thought, well at least movie thing came up and I thought, Oh, let's see what this is all about. And you know what? It's probably an hour long. And it wasn't what I was expecting at all, but it's basically about how dreadfully he was treated and bullied and everything else while he was younger because he was so tall and all the rest of it, and how how he was just different. But he stuck with it. So it's a real feel good to it. But the bit that was a real eye opener for me.

Speaker 4 (00:59:30) - His wife is Abbey Clancy, isn't it? And he was showing her some of the press clippings and showing her his first his first England match when he came on. And they're at Wembley, 80,000 people who are booing him because he's tall and Peter Crouch. And it's just absolutely fascinating. His own fans are booing this guy just because the way he looked. And then he sort of puts them all to go to scores this goal and they all shut up. But the really interesting bit for me was his wife had never seen any of this stuff. And you could see her like getting more and more angry with it. And she said, why do people why are they like this? And he's like, well, you know, that's the way it is. And going sort of tying into sort of Sophie said, it's really interesting how they bring their kids up knowing how he was treated, if that makes sense, how they've learned from it. So it's a really it's worth an hour of your time. Nothing if you hate football doesn't matter because it's nothing to do with football really, but really, really worth worth doing.

Speaker 4 (01:00:24) - That's on Amazon Prime. And the other thing that I've found initially on LinkedIn, someone post it the other day, you may have seen it. I hadn't. It's a Ted Talk video from someone called Molly Wright and she's the youngest ever Ted Talk person. Firstly, as a presenter, she's amazing. I mean, I think she's seven, eight, I'm going to say maybe slightly older, but it's all about how. Adults working with the kids and then all of a sudden picking up the phone or going on a laptop, How that affects them and how it affects their development. And it's all about how we can work with our kids up until the age of five. And if we don't get it right up until that point, how much it affects them going forward. So Molly right is her name. I think she's Australian. The Ted talks from 2021 and we'll put a link to it in the show notes. If you've got I think it's only about 7 or 8 minutes long. It's the most heartwarming, amazing presentation I think I've seen for many a year.

Speaker 4 (01:01:24) - So I'll link to it. But just, just Google. Molly Right. Ted Talk and see what comes up. It's fantastic. I'm not going to tell you what she talks about, but it's all about how how much we can learn is and obviously she's got this audience of adults there who are sitting there thinking, yeah, actually, you're right. It's really well worth it. Seriously, find it.

Speaker 3 (01:01:47) - All right. So I'm going to go look for it now.

Speaker 4 (01:01:48) - Yeah. No, seriously. And once you've once you've looked at it, promise me this. Once you've looked at it, post something on LinkedIn or just drop me a note and go, Oh my God, you know, it might just be me. I've got it saved and.

Speaker 3 (01:02:00) - I'm really awkward if it is, if I watch it and I'm just like, What was that? That I'm going to have to pretend that, yeah, I'm just going to.

Speaker 4 (01:02:06) - Just pretend you haven't. I think you're really like it. It really.

Speaker 4 (01:02:10) - It made me think. You know, it made me think. Don't pick up your phone because your daughters just walked in the room. That's exactly what it made me feel. Bear in mind, my daughters are 16 and 18. You think I should know that by now? But even at that age, anyway. Here we go, Caleb. So what we're going to do now, because we're over an hour. Jonathan's nowhere to be seen. He's off surfing or whatever he's doing.

Speaker 2 (01:02:34) - Think what? All I'd want to know is if we want to connect with you in the future about anything about immersive learn or make real or carry on this conversation. What's the best way to do that? Sophie?

Speaker 3 (01:02:47) - Come on, look for me on LinkedIn. I've been a bit quiet on LinkedIn, actually. I will up my game. And then obviously there's the make real website as well with all our contact information. But yeah, we're a friendly bunch, so reach out to any of us at any time through the website or on LinkedIn.

Speaker 3 (01:03:04) - This one's. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:03:06) - Well I think all that leaves us to say thanks for listening. We really hope you enjoyed the conversation. And as always, just drop us a line if you think we ought to be discussing something or a specific guest.

Speaker 4 (01:03:19) - Thanks very much, Sophie. Good to see you again, Caleb. Speak to you next month. Hope Jonathan's all right. Fall into the sea or something, but I'm sure he's fine. Probably out on his bike.